


Laufeyjason

by spaceleviathan



Category: Thor (Movies)
Genre: I have a complicated idea about what a female Jotun is, I've just made up my own idea of what the Jotun culture is like, Laufey isn't as bad as he seems deep down, Laufey-centric, Odin's an idiot, Other, and Laufey is one of them, really deep down
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-29
Updated: 2012-11-29
Packaged: 2017-11-19 21:08:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,120
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/577668
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spaceleviathan/pseuds/spaceleviathan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which a child is stolen, and Laufey has to cope with his loss alone.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Laufeyjason

**Author's Note:**

> Note: My idea of what makes a male and female Jötun isn't fully explained in this, so here's a theory for you guys to keep in mind as you read this:  
> The crown is passed down through the oldest child, whether they're male or female, but to keep it they have to prove themselves. It's a crown which can be fought for.  
> Laufey is a female - nicknamed Nál by some for possessing a slighter stature to most other Frost Giants - and the crown came down to her through her mother. It is perfectly acceptable for a female Jötun, especially one in such a position of power, to portray themselves as males. That is not so much a reflection of their culture, but a reflection of other cultures. Males are generally seen as more powerful, especially to the Æsir, and so Laufey reacted to that. Due to that she takes on the pronoun 'he', so don't call him 'her' from here on out.  
> As a female, he married a male, and Laufey is the one to bear their children.  
> Physically, I assumed that - to other species - male and female Jötuns look alike and sound alike, which is why Laufey is a scary, growly, masculine-looking bloke, despite the fact the mythology says the complete opposite. It's a known phenomenon anyway, as sometimes humans look to people of other nationalities and find it hard to distinguish between individuals. This is the same, only a little more extreme as it extends to gender as well.  
> The choice of being referred to as a male is, in my little vision of Jötunheimr, typical of Jötun warriors, but it isn't necessary, which is why there is a openly female Jötun in Laufey's company.

Laufey, struggling to stand, arms shaking in pain from battle and the rest of him quivering from humiliation, was furious. He supposed he was lucky to get away with his life, but in such circumstances it felt like a death sentence.

They could feel it, every Jötun in every corner of this land, as Odin’s soldiers took the Casket from its rightful place in the temple. It burned deep within them - the loss and the rage and the implications of it leaving the ice behind; Jötunheim was to fall to ruin without its power, and Laufey could already see the splendour of his realm dimming, the cold suddenly startling, the ground protesting the departure of the Jötun treasure.

The king stood up, straight back and proud, steadfastly refusing to limp, his injuries naught but an afterthought as he made his way towards the direction of his army.

Laufey’s eyes sought out the Corpse-Father amongst the numerous bloodied Æsir. Shining, tiny, dripping men who were trudging a perilous path over broken hoarfrost and over flaccid bodies of fallen brothers and enemies. Sneering, as he found the golden glow which had outlined his defeat, Laufey watched.

It was not difficult to pick out Odin All-Father amongst even his own colourful kind. A black, oozing socket tried to glance across the battle-field to the hunched and wary Jötuns, failed, and Laufey smirked at his own small victory, clutching a single small, blue eye within his fist.

He saw, now that he had a clear view of the War-Father, that it was not Odin who carried the Casket of Jötunheim. Considering himself to be below his station to touch such a thing was a notion maddening to Laufey, his fury rising. So enraged was he that he failed to notice that Odin’s arms were already laden down with something other than simply weapons used to kill Frost Giants; a bundle of just a certain shape, held in a very particular way - something that was, if only to Laufey, as equally precious as the Casket of Ancient Winters.

“No!” He roared eventually, reality a sharp stab of consciousness amid a livid haze of danger. In his great rush to reach the Potent-God, Laufey threw aside even his own. “Odin!”

What was left of the Æsir army look startled, and rightly so, thought Laufey. He would haunt their nightmares if he allowed any of them to survive. He may keep them chained and bleeding and breathing for weeks. How he was going to enjoy tearing them limb-from-limb - quite especially the  _Victory_ -Father, whom he was ready  to disembowel in front of all remaining soldiers for touching what was  _not his_  to even set his now singular eye upon.

But Laufey was robbed of any chance at rapturous torture, for as he approached, mere seconds away from swiping the head off of Odin’s very shoulders in one powerful blow, the Bifrost activated and the hateful Æsir were swept up back to their own shining realm eternal. Laufey’s hand met but air, and his outraged howl permeated the thin silence that had been left behind.

Laufey spun and sagely any Jötuns fled from his path, chary of the murderous eyes and knowing what lengths such pain and fury could drive their king to. They’d seen him angry before, no doubt, to make them so wise, and could recognise that same vicious gleam which presented itself whenever battle arose. It was something the soldiers took strength from, knowing with certainty how far their king and leader could go, and a confidence in that he was not a creature to be taken advantage of.

Now, battle over and no threat imminent, they feared it. They feared where that gaze would point at next.

Laufey was ignorant of the bustling bodies, crowds of blue stepping aside with terror motivating their urgency. His focus had sharpened and his heading was the temple, where he’d visited only days before with a single order and an accompanying threat. Both had been simple, and neither had been satisfied. Laufey was on a trail that would correct one of those wrongs. Should the priests that hid away from the battle in the temple still breathe than he would ensure they would continue to do so for a very long time, though they would regret and feel remorse for every time they did.

A few warriors followed dutifully behind him, not out of loyalty but nor out of fear, and Fárbauti was chief amongst them as well as the only one daring enough to fall into his king’s stride.

“Laufey?” He questions, his eyes agleam like a ruby, hard and unforgiving and sparkling, and Laufey was helpless but to snarl.

“Did you not see?” He demanded. “Do you not have sight within those eyes? That which the Dread One stole!”

“The Casket, we are aware, we felt as you did-“

“No!” He roared, the cry echoing around the dull ice which shivered from the volume and ferocity of the wrath he withheld. “He gripped it in his hands! He left with what is mine!”

Fárbauti saw the path they were storming then, as their destination hovered on the horizon. The temple was a crumbling tower, like all the buildings looked in such a vicious aftermath, and it lacked a radiance in its walls which had made the ice so holy. Now, without the Casket to maintain it, it was as much a building as any other structure on the planet. Observing, Fárbauti faltered in his step, taking a moment to piece his clues together.

“My king.” He said, sounding pitiful for Laufey, if only for Laufey’s sake. If it had been any other to adopt such a tone Laufey would have cut him down where he stood. Instead, Laufey ignored the manner in which his husband spoke and entered the temple with a great cry of war.

“Show your face, cowards! You must pay for your crimes to Jötunheim!” His voice was an empty echo, an exclamation repetitively bouncing around high ceilings and once hallowed chambers.

In the centre of the imposing arched hall was a pedestal upon which the Casket of Ancient Winters should have sat. It was now left vacant, obviously so, with its absence drawing attention to the space it should be more than its presence ever had. It pained them to stand where something so essential to Jötunheim should have been. Yet, this wasn’t Laufey’s concern. It had been dictated in Laufey’s agreement for peace to give away the Casket, and though he knew his subjects would be angry at him for many years to come for his weakness, he also knew there would one day be a chance at getting it back. On the other hand, once a race is extinct, he had reasoned within himself as he lay down on the ground with Odin All-Father looming above him, they do not have a habit in returning for the things they had lost.

Noise further down narrower corridors had Laufey’s instincts alight and alert. As he moved down the darkened rooms, he saw, as Fárbauti did, evidence of the Æsir’s presence even as they drew further away from where the Casket had stood.

“Why did they come so deep within?” Einar asked and Laufey shook his head. He was not sure and was far too angry to even theorise. He wanted blood, he hungered and twitched for it, and he could hear echoing footsteps as the priests heard the more disturbing sound of his - each footfall to them were the thud of their deaths steadily approaching.

Fárbauti spoke instead when the others had sense enough to realise Laufey was not about to humour any single of their questions no matter how reasonable they may be, nor how much he himself wanted them answered.

“Why did you place him here?” He instead asked - the most impertinent and unwelcome query an individual could have thought up. Perhaps Laufey should have expected it from his husband.

“The temple is the furthest any can go.” He returned lowly, but not quietly enough that his other soldiers could not overhear. For surely Fárbauti wasn’t the only one bemused. “If the Æsir got to the temple it would mean I was dead. If I wasn’t dead then they would not have made it here.”

“But they did.” Fárbauti brusquely reminded him.

“I agreed only to stop the killing.” Laufey growled. “I did not believe the War-Lord to have such a streak of cruelty within him, since the Æsir claim to be above us. Yet, it seems that they could not leave without one last parting shot.” His tone had grown ever deeper as they progressed further into the temple, following the foreign footprints and drops of blood as much as the echoes from the feet of holy deadmen.

“You should have known otherwise, Nál.” Fárbauti sneered, which had Laufey a half-turn from gouging his eyes out in a parody of his previous attack upon the All-Father, before making his husband eat them. Nál was not a name to ever be used, even in a jest or in private. It was a name Laufey did not and never would associate himself with, regardless of his slim stature and despite the fact it was he who bore their children. But, thankfully for Fárbauti, Laufey was swiftly distracted as they turned to a wide cavernous annex, the same towering arches as before stretched high above them. They were constructions which were reliably solid, stable and holding, despite the fragmented mess that detailed the rest of the room. There, near a platform which usually held all holy relics, three bodies lay - two were priests, and one was an enemy warrior.

“So the priests do have some guts.” Ulm barked out, kneeling besides the fallen Æsir, but nobody addressed his comment.

“The tracks stop here. In this place they turned and left.” Fárbauti noted, as if Laufey was incapable of discerning this for himself. His patience was running thin now for both his husband and for this infuriating quest and he dashed from the room thunderously. The priests were not quick enough this time; they didn’t have enough warning to know they had been found and didn’t get to scurry away and quiver to a new hiding place like mice as the hungry cat came too close in pursuit.

Laufey took down two of them by smashing one head-first into a wall and twisting the other’s neck sharply. Fárbauti, who had followed him, took down another with a thrown icicle whilst Brynja, the swiftest of the four courageous Jötuns which had pursued Laufey here, caught the final one and held him out for her king’s inspection.

Laufey took the offering by the neck and held him slightly above the icy ground. His name was Halvard and Laufey was going to violently wipe him out of living memory. But first, he was going to explain some minor details Laufey was still perplexed upon.

“You let him be taken.” He breathed, voice hardly above a whisper. “You will not be forgiven for this.”

Halvard struggled against the crushing grip around his throat, wheezing, struggling for breath. Laufey felt Halvard should count himself lucky that he was still breathing at all.

“Did they kill him?” He snarled. “Did they kill Keir? Did they kill  _my son_?”

Halvard shook his head desperately, but the fact Laufey’s heir was alive was little comfort considering the child most likely wouldn’t remain so for very long in the frightful hands of the Æsir. The fact the priests were alive, or had been, was evidence only of the fact they had not fought hard enough to keep Laufey’s son away from their enemy’s clutches.

“You let your prince be taken from your protection.” He said. “Your king trusted you to keep him hidden and safe, if only because any one of you would be too much of a coward to go running into danger. Did you leave him behind as a sacrifice to save your own worthless skins?”

Halvard was trying to speak, babbling, gasping, choking, but Laufey did not want to hear excuses. “You need only answer yes or no.” He shook the man, before throwing him to the ground. The crunch of bone and the howl of pain wouldn’t have tugged the heartstrings of even a youngster upon Laufey’s unforgiving arctic lands; on hardened, battle-learned warriors it didn’t make them so much as blink; to a mourning mother it was a sound which brought naught but pleasure.

“The child was crying!” Halvard screeched, the words raw as they rose from his black-bruised throat. “Distressed by the screaming outside! The barbarians followed the noise! They had already taken the Casket of Ancient Winters - we did not know they would cause further harm to us.”

It was just like Laufey had assumed: his child should have remained safe and untouched because Odin had only been after the Casket, or so the aged one had claimed. The priests had no reason to suspect that the soldiers would snatch up a Jötun child, as the Æsir claimed to put themselves above the murder of infants. There was no reason to take such an action if there was no intent for a death at the end of it.

Laufey glanced up at Fárbauti, who held a look about him - one which suggested he was thinking something ridiculous, if not deeply disturbing. Laufey usually welcomed such thoughts from his spouse, especially as they tended to relate to unusual but ultimately successful tactics in battle, but here it simply unsettled him.

He stepped on the neck of the babbling worm of a Jötun at his feet and cursed the priests’ very existence. His soldiers did not question his actions. Though the priest had no idea that the Æsir was going to snatch away Laufey’s son, it did not excuse leaving the child alone and defenceless and reliant only on the enemy’s mercy. They should have guarded him above all else, as their prince or as a child, most especially before themselves.

The runt, and Laufey wouldn’t shy away from the fact the child was such, was a delicate specimen, curious and tiny. It was born unable to protect itself, constantly shivering against the freezing temperatures of the world it was sired in, in need of endless attention and time. If not for the sparks of raw magic Laufey had felt crawl in those veins as he had first held the pathetic creature in his hands, he would have never allowed it to continue living. But Laufey had seen potential in the slight of a Jötun, and thus, it had taken only a moment to shed himself of his disgust.

He remembered, as he stood in that howling temple looking dispassionately down at the blank eyes of the late priests, first touching the shock of black hair, marvelling over it, then running his far too large fingers over the curved markings on the child’s forehead; ones that proved beyond doubt that the little thing he held truly belonged to him. Across his wrists, the child had three lines which were distinctive of Fárbauti’s ancestors, but nothing else claimed the child was anyone’s but Laufey’s.

Truly, initially he had been repulsed by the idea and by what it meant that he, of all Jötuns - the king and war hero and most powerful of them all - would bear an heir which was half the size of a normal child; a sickly little thing which could not even withstand the cold and had to be wrapped in furs. The same furs which Laufey saw now lay abandoned in an unkempt heap near a dead priest.

But the magic had dismissed all those fears and repugnance, and the strength that Laufey had sensed shimmering underneath much too pale blue skin made Laufey confident that this child was not as weak as it appeared. When the infant eventually opened his eyes to the world, they were deep red, probing, vibrant and perfect.

Laufey called him Keir, meaning little dark one, and Fárbauti had laughed when he was told. He had gone through none of Laufey’s anger at the child’s size and shivering form, not that Laufey was in any way surprised. His husband had always been distant and disassociated from both Laufey and all Jötuns he’d had the displeasure to meet, and Laufey would not have been able to stand his presence in his bed chambers if the warrior had been anything else. If Fárbauti ever noticed the markings on Keir’s miniscule wrists then it meant nothing to him. This, Laufey was glad for - Keir was his, and his alone.

That disgust he first felt when he’d seen the child he’d bore had quickly turned into adoration and possessiveness. He had gone so far as to hide his son from the Æsir for as long as he could. If he had died, then it didn’t matter where Keir was - it was a certainly that he was going to die as well, along with the rest of the Frost Giants. This was why Laufey shook in anger now, because the wrong scenario had played out, one he had never considered happening: he’d survived where his son would not, despite all he had done to keep the little one out of danger.

He looked up again, catching Fárbauti’s eye - which was that same shade of crimson which had brought him joy before when they belonged to another, but where, for now at least, it only made him clench his fists.

“Possibly they thought him abandoned.” And there was that ridiculous thought which Laufey had seen lurking behind his husband’s eye. “He was a runt, after all. Furthermore, the child had your markings, which would likely add further weight to the idea - why would the king of Jötunheim keep a weak, sickly creature such as that?”

Laufey’s expression did not change, but his steady eye contact with Fárbauti promised a brutal end by Laufey’s own two hands. Fárbauti could read whatever he wished into it, but with it Laufey swore to find all that in the nine realms which the warrior feared and spend a long, leisurely time using them to bring him to a slow, torturous demise. Until that time, however, Laufey contented himself with letting his husband’s own vivid imagination fill in the empty space where he had deliberately abandoned words.

“He’ll be dead by the morn.” Stated Brynja, though not unkindly, wisely keeping any and all emotions, be they pity or disappointment in her king, away from her voice. The woman was shrewd enough to survive this long by employing careful words, as Ulm and Einar remained alive and held in high regard by Laufey by remaining silent when confronted with a situation they were unequipped to deal with. How someone had not removed the burden of Fárbauti’s head from his shoulders was another matter entirely. Why Laufey hadn’t done it himself was a question emphasised by his husband’s next statement.

“We will have other sons, wife, and they will be true Jötuns - not silly things you took pity on as their mother.”

Burning looks were perhaps too subtle for the man, so Laufey tried a knife to the throat instead.

Laufey was king because his mother had been one, but blood did not mean a great deal in Jötunheim. An individual that was weak or incompetent quickly lost the throne, publicly and fatally. Fárbauti was fast, a deadly warrior and one of the best Jötunheim had to offer - the ideal candidate for king of the Jötuns. Yet, despite this, Laufey remained with the crown, and he remained for one reason only: Laufey  _was_  the best. He had Fárbauti trapped beneath his body weight and bleeding before they’d even hit the floor. Fárbauti didn’t struggle under his king, just let their eyes meet - a blazing red to calm crimson - and nodded his head once.

“I’ve already recognised your loss, my king.” He said, respectfully enough to not garner a sentence of treason, though it was chilling, as always. “You may mourn, but I advice against doing it where others can see.”

Laufey pressed his knife further against the warrior’s throat. Blood ran slow across his neck and dripped steadily onto the floor beneath them. Neither of them paid it any attention.

“You believe I am a fool, Fárbauti? You think of me in such a way when you yourself cannot even display astuteness enough hold your tongue. I believe it  _wise_  to remove it for you if you cannot be trusted to use it prudently.”

Laufey pushed up and off the man after staring down at him for another long minute, putting a foot to Fárbauti’s chest heavily in warning as he tried to follow.

“You will allow me to overcome my loss as I see fit, warrior, and until then you shall not speak - you will utter  _no_  words to any in the land until I deem myself healed enough that your voice will anger me no further. If I hear or find out that you have made any sort of sound until then I will take the capacity from you altogether, and know with great verity, my husband, that my wrath will not end at your tongue.”

Eyes narrowed, looking all but a hair’s breadth away from opening his mouth to talk just to spite his wife, Fárbauti managed another nod. He didn’t lower his eyes, but Laufey didn’t expect him to.

“Neither will you be in my presence until I summon you. You would do well to make yourself scarce from this place until you receive my message.” Laufey himself could not gauge how much time that might take, but it mattered little. Fárbauti was largely irrelevant in Laufey’s life and never had meant any great deal to him other than as an individual of good breeding to father Laufey’s children, along with a loyal, highly skilled killer. Now that the war was over - at least for the meantime - even his role as warrior had been rendered insignificant.

Laufey led himself out of the temple, the four others following with a fair enough amount of space between them and their king, but remaining keenly aware that if Laufey truly wanted them dead than there was no minimum safe distance that would allow them to keep hold of their lives.

Outside, stretching on forever before them, the city was in ruins and was only crumbling further every time one of the Frost Giants attempted to build over a crack. Without the Casket the city would never be as it once was, and the sooner they became accustomed to this new state of reduced living the swifter they would be able to regain some sort of dignity and strength, even if it was constructed purely out of fury and bone-deep hatred directed at the Æsir race.

“You will find the rest of the priests.” He snapped to Ulm, Einar and Brynja. “And you will string them up in the dungeons. I will see to them in time.” Before then they would be fair game for anyone who wished to make a punching bag out of them. So long as they weren’t killed, any Jötun was free to take out their frustrations on prisoners. Some considered it a game, though Laufey didn’t know the rules. He tended to keep away from it all as it was nothing to bother himself with. He had other punching bags - namely, anyone he could point a finger at. Usually his own husband, who gloriously fought back.

Laufey sat on his throne in the remains of what has been a crystal palace - something which had delighted Keir so in its glittering majesty. He could see through war-inflicted holes in the walls and the roof the helpless struggles of his people, and finally left alone he seethed.

Already his heart was hardening, knowing that if his son was not dead already then he would be soon. Even if by some miracle they kept him alive, Asgard was no place for a Jötun. Laufey would prefer to think of his child dead than tortured throughout his life by the sneers and disapproval of those around him, being kept like Odin’s pet, as something the All-Father took pity on in the child’s tiny stature and vulnerability, no taller, as he would prove to be, than any average Æsir. If that did happen, it was all Laufey could do but pray that magic that coursed in the child’s Jötun blood would achieve it’s true potential and allow the boy passage home.

He didn’t hold much hope for this, though, and was quick to dismiss the idea as nothing but a fantasy - something unfit for a king to hold onto. He was starting to accept the inevitable as he observed the dead of his armies being picked up, taken into the distance and thrown onto a large funeral pyre. The Æsir corpses, on the other hand, were being ripped apart, their bloody entrails being furiously thrown at now delicate ice walls.

Laufey worked to consciously let go of his son, else he’d simply get dragged into desperatemadness and misery. So there, in the decaying ramparts of his home, sitting on his melting throne and dusted in the ashes of the dead, he understood that he was never to lay eyes on his son again.

The eye of Odin All-Father, which had managed to remain largely undamaged despite Laufey’s rage, was now finally reduced to mush inside his clenched fist.

\---

“And after all I’ve done for you.” The Áss smirked, green eyes glittering with malicious intent.

Laufey had seen the boy before, of course. He was Loki of Asgard, the second son of Odin, who bore little resemblance to either of his yellow-haired parents nor his similarly coloured older brother. The creature before him was small, as all Æsir were, with hair blacker than the night skies overhead, and eyes a poisonous emerald. An unusual specimen of his race - a species which was much more prone to bearing children with hair blazing like the fires they light to fight the cold of night, or spun like so much gold thread. It wasn’t strange, of course, to spawn those with a head coloured like the brown of the trees that grew aplenty in Asgard, but rare was one with such an empty colour as Loki Odinson’s - like looking into Ginungagap itself.

His eyes spoke of the magic he wielded in battle, which was his distinct advantage over most, if not all, opponents. Laufey did not know of the extent of the boy’s skills, but he always seemed to have a original deadly trick to unveil each time he fought his next opponent. That he could hide others from the all-seeing eye of Heimdall was a testament to the sheer depth of talent he possessed.

But it was remarkable in itself for a male of Asgard to accept magic. They all had some amount of it - as the Jötun’s did with their innate ability to control the ice around them, some even capable of shape-shifting - but magic was considered more a feminine skill to the Æsir. A foolish opinion, many of the Jötun’s thought, to believe that not only was magic a lesser art than skill with a blade or a bow, but also that females were less dangerous with their talents. That the son of Odin War-Father decided to unleash his ability despite what others must say about his choices was another curious addition to add to this bizarre being’s growing list of enigmas.

“So, you’re the one.” Laufey drawled, leaning forward to study Loki closer. Confident and calm, the boy didn’t even seem cold despite the fact he surely must be. He was wearing no extra layers besides his cloak than he had last time, as far as Laufey could recall, and it had only been a few days ago - it was unlikely the Odinson had forgotten the biting sub-zero temperatures of Jötunheim.

Loki’s proposal didn’t sit completely right with Laufey, to be true, because there was something sharper in those eyes than what had been present when they’d met the first time, before Thor, the brash oldest son who was a spitting image of his father, had restarted the war between the two races. Before he’d broken the treaty Jötunheim had paid so much for; that Laufey had paid so much for.

Now, something that looked uncomfortably close to knowledge lay behind Loki’s vicious eyes, and he didn’t bother to hide it as he stared at Laufey directly, as he hadn’t bothered to hide his contempt towards Jötunheim only seconds earlier. Loki knew that Laufey would accept his offer, regardless of how much he showed himself hateful of the species he was making a deal with, nor how suspicious said deal seemed, but that wasn’t the end of Loki’s knowing. Not being aware of the information Loki possessed was deeply disturbing to Laufey.

Helblindi could feel it too, and was shifting in his place, trying to restrain himself from lashing out and splitting the sneering Áss in two. Loki caught sight of him and could no doubt read Helblindi’s thoughts from his body language, as his smirk twitched further up his face. Before them all stood a snide and arrogant creature, deceitful and cruel and cunning and deadly. He would have fit in perfectly amongst the Frost Giants, had he only been born into the right species. Fárbauti would have especially found great fondness for him, even if only because Loki was equally as callous and conniving as Fárbauti had been, and somehow even more impudent. The thought of an individual with such a striking resemblance to a warrior Jötun being born so deeply within Asgard put a smile on Laufey’s face, if only for a moment.

For some reason his thoughts jumped, in a way they hadn’t in over a thousand years, to a child lost, and then to even before the war, when Laufey had once taken a rare moment to imagine the future and what that small creature with so much deadly potential could one day become. He looked to the dark-haired prince of Asgard but for a time could only see blue skin in place of the pale peach and glowing red irises where there was truly green. The crown prince of Jötunheim briefly stood before him in all his splendour and smirking, battle-earned glory. It was an illusion that took but a second to dissolve, disappearing to reveal the second Odinson instead of the first Laufeyjason. Laufey forcefully removed the thought from his mind and pushed himself to offer an echo of Loki’s cruel smile.

“I accept.”


End file.
